Lucky Seven (11 page)

“You can have it,” he said. “It’s been sitting here collecting dust. It needs a new paint job and a driver and, of course,”
he added, smiling, “a chassis, and motor!”

“What make body is it?”

“A Stingray. And it’s ½4th scale.”

Chick took it. “Thanks, Ken. You sure you don’t want anything for it?”

“I said I’m giving it to you, didn’t I?

” Chick grinned. “Yes, you did.”

On his way home he met Butch Slade. He and Butch hadn’t said more than a dozen words to each other in the last week. That
silly argument had created a void in his life, left a hole so big he didn’t know what he could do to close it again. He had
missed Butch. They’d been buddies as long as he could remember.

“Hi,” said Butch. “You still sore?”

Chick stared in surprise. “Sore? Heck, no. Why should I be sore?”

Butch shrugged and grinned a small grin. “Are you going to enter the events at Mort’s a week from Saturday? He’s giving some
good prizes. You can have a chance to build up your equipment.”

“I think so. Matter of fact, see this?” Chick held up the shell of the Stingray. “I’m going to dress up this bomb, put a chassis
in it and enter it in the Concours.”

“Man, you have a lot of dressing up to do on that one.”

“I know. But I’m going to do it, anyway. I’ve got that brass tube frame that I won and I’ll use the motor from the Ferrari.
It’ll be almost like a second car.”

“More like a first!” Butch laughed. “Well, good luck.”

They parted and Chick felt much happier. How do you like that? Neither had to apologize to the other. They were friends again,
just like that.

The next evening Chick began soldering the pieces for the chassis in the basement. A week from Saturday were the Heat Races,
the Semifinals and the Main events. A week from Saturday!

He began to sweat and had trouble holding the tip of the soldering iron on the joints. He put down the strip of solder he
had cut from the spool and wiped his forehead. He’d never get the car done in time to enter it in the Concours and Semis.
Never!

He felt like giving up then and there. There would be other Concourses. Other races with prizes.

He set the iron aside, pressed his fists tightly against his eyes and swallowed hard. His left elbow struck the soldering
iron and knocked it off the table. It banged against the leg of the bench and fell to the floor.

He picked it up and heard footsteps on the stairs. Who was it? Mom? Dad?

“What fell, Chick?”

It was Dad.

“The—the soldering iron.”

Dad came beside him. Chick was holding the iron and strip of solder above the joint he wanted to solder.

“You’ve been down here quite some time,” Dad said. “What have you done so far?”

For a second or two Chick was quiet. Then he answered, “Nothing.”

“That’s what I thought. What do you have to do?”

Chick told him. “But I can do it,” he added hastily. “You don’t have to—”

“What do you want soldered, Chick?” interrupted Dad.

Chick swallowed, then explained. Dad soldered the pieces of the chassis and secured the motor while Chick painted the body
a royal blue and the white circle and figure 8 with their respective colors.

The next night, while Dad worked on the axles and wheels, Chick drew an instrument panel on a file card and painted it. Then
he cut two small pieces of wire and dabbed one end of each with cement and fitted both of them to the windshield. By now the
paint on the file card was dry. He cut out the instrument panel and glued it in place.

“Wipers and instrument panel,” said his father, smiling. “A nice touch. The chassis’s all ready, Chick.”

Chick fitted the body to it, then set the finished model on the bench.

“A beauty, son,” said Dad. “Keep this up and you’ll wind up being an automobile designer.”

Chick laughed. “They make a lot of money, Dad?”

Dad chuckled. “More than a clerk like myself.”

The next evening he put the revamped Stingray through its paces at
Mort’s Pit Stop.
Dad was with him.

“Only fifteen laps,” said Chick in disappointment after a two-minute trial run. “That’s not enough. It has to do at least
eighteen or it won’t have a chance.”

“What can we do?”

“Rewind the motor. But I don’t know how…”

“That’ll increase its gear ratio, won’t it? I’ll help you.”

Dad rewound the motor. The next day they took the Stingray back to Mort’s. This time the Stingray hit eighteen laps and three
sections.

“It’s coming, Dad,” Chick said triumphantly.

On Friday, the day before the races, he and Ken went to
Mort’s Pit Stop,
registered, paid their entry fees and had their cars inspected. Mort himself inspected them.

“Going to enter your cars in the Con-cours?” he asked.

“Yes,” replied Chick.

“Then you’d better be here early. The Con-cours starts at one-thirty sharp.”

“We’ll be here,” said Chick.

They read the Model Car Racing announcement before leaving.

SATURDAY, NOV. 16

1:30
P.M.
CONCOURS D’ELEGANCE

2:00
P.M.
HEAT RACE

2:30
P.M.
FIRST CONSOLATION RACE

Ribbons to first 2 winners

3:00
P.M.
SECOND CONSOLATION RACE

Ribbons to first 2 winners

3:30
P.M.
SEMI-MAIN EVENT

Ribbons to first 2 winners

4:00
P.M.
MAIN EVENT

No Limitation

“They’re pretty good prizes,” observed Ken.

“I’ll say.” Chick’s pulse was already speeding up.

The Concours d’Elégance was on.

There were twenty-three cars entered, all lined up at an angle and side by side on a shelf by the wall left of the raceway.
Eddie Lane was judge, as before. Each boy with a car in the Concours waited breathlessly.

Mine won’t win,
thought Chick, his hands clasped tightly behind him.
There are too many that are more good-looking.
That bright shiny red Lola GT, for example. That Mako Shark II with Firestone lettered on the tires. And that sharp, forest-green
Camaro with the chrome door handles and silver bumpers. They’re terrific.

The judge added up the scores. At last he picked up the blue ribbons. Chick breathed ever so slowly. The fifth prize went
to the Mako Shark II. The fourth prize to a green Rover BRM. The third prize… Chick
breathed easier now. There was no use being anxious. His Stingray had no chance. The third prize went to an orange Ferrari.
The second prize, a red ribbon… Chick’s heart pounded like a hammer gone crazy.
The judge was putting it on his Stingray!

Someone—Ken—slapped him on the shoulder. “Chick! You won second prize! A deluxe controller!”

Chick was dazed.

The first prize went to the Camaro with the chrome door handles.

“Nice going, Chick,” said Jack Harmon, whose entry was a pink Chaparral. “That’s the second time you’ve won a prize in a Con-cours.
Well, let’s see what your bomb can do in the Heat!”

Don’t sass him back,
thought Chick.
Don’t let him get your goat. Remember the wise words of Mr. Duffy.

At three minutes of two Eddie Lane made an announcement. “Attention, racers! The Heat Race will begin in exactly three minutes.
It will last for two minutes. There are twenty-three entries. The six drivers who complete the most laps in the two minutes
are qualified to enter the Main Event. Drivers who place eighteenth through twenty-third will compete in the First Consolation
Race. The first two winners in that race will then compete in the Second Consolation Race. The other four are eliminated.

“Drivers who place thirteenth through seventeenth will compete in the Second Consolation Race with the two winners of the
First Consolation Race. The first two winners in this race will compete in the Semi-Main Event. The other five drivers are
eliminated. Drivers who place seventh through twelfth in the Heat Race will also compete in the Semi-Main Event. The first
two winners in the Semi-Main Event will compete in the Main Event. The remaining five are eliminated.

“I’ll call off your names in the order that you’ve registered. Choose your lane, take two
practice laps, then wait at the starting line. Number One, Dick Ealy. Number Two, Jack Harmon. Number Three, Harry Mills
...”

Eddie called off eight names. Chick’s wasn’t one of them. After the eight drivers raced, eight more would be called and then
the remaining seven for the Heat Race.

Color stickers, matching the lanes for identification, were put on the cars. Then the cars were lined up. Jack’s was in the
yellow lane, Number 7. Four turn marshals were in their positions at the corners.

“Okay,” said Eddie. “At the count of three! Thumbs down! One! Two! Three!”

Eddie switched on the power and the cars took off. They streaked to the first hairpin curve, slowed briefly, their tails whipping
out ever so slightly. A black Lola 40 scrambled into the lead going into the second curve, followed by two Ferraris, and Jack
Harmon’s Chaparral fourth. For two laps there was little change. Then the Chaparral moved up into third position and held
the spot for five laps.

Suddenly one of the Ferraris spun out at the dangerous S-curve at the underpass. An instant later, just as the turn marshal
shouted “Track!,” the car in the next lane struck the spunout racer and deslotted.

The turn marshal placed the cars quickly back on the tracks. At the count of “Three!” the race continued. The black Lola held
the lead for the next four laps, creeping steadily ahead. A Ferrari was in second place, Jack Harmon’s Chaparral in third.

At the end of a minute the black Lola had covered ten laps, the Ferrari nine and Jack’s Chaparral eight laps and ten sections.

Jack’s Chaparral crept ahead, gaining at the curves. The seconds ticked off slowly while the cars gobbled up the sections.

“Time’s up!” Eddie Lane yelled. “Don’t touch your cars till I get their laps recorded!”

A Ferrari 250 GTO came in first with nineteen laps, four sections. Jack Harmon’s Chaparral came in second with eighteen laps,
seventeen sections.

Seconds later Eddie had them recorded, then called off the names of the next eight drivers. Chick waited breathlessly. At
last: “Number Six, Chick Grover. Number Seven, Kenneth Jason. Number Eight—”

Chick chose the orange lane, Number 3. Ken, the green lane, Number 2. They put color stickers on their cars. The drivers took
two trial laps each, then the race began.

Chick’s hand was warm on the controller, his thumb pressing the plunger way down as the royal blue Stingray shot for the first
curve. Up on the plunger. Down again on the short straightaway. Up again as the car approached the second turn. The tail whipped
slightly as the Stingray burst across the stretch to the underpass, slowed briefly as it negotiated the S-curve, then shot
like a blue streak down the long stretch near the wall to the sweeper. Down it came and breezed like a bullet in front of
Chick to complete its first lap.

A racer spun out on its second lap. Another deslotted and roared over the tracks, tumbling over the side to the floor as it
tried to take the
inside curve of the steep, wide bend too fast.

Seconds later the racer in the white lane spun out on the first S-curve. The car in the purple lane stalled almost in the
same section. At the end of the Heat Race the car in the blue lane came in first with eighteen laps, three sections; the car
in the purple lane seventeen laps, eight sections; Chick’s car in the orange lane seventeen laps, two sections; Ken’s car
in the green lane sixteen laps, eight sections; the car in the yellow lane sixteen laps, four sections and the car in the
black lane fifteen laps, one section.

All of the last seven cars finished the Heat. Eddie Lane tallied the points. Chick and Ken waited anxiously.

“Beat you by a lap and a half,” said a voice at Chick’s elbow.

Chick stiffened. “So what? That was just the Heat.”

Jack Harmon chuckled. “I know. I never do as well as I can in Heats. I’m best in Semis or Mains, where it really counts.”

The braggart, thought Chick coldly.

“Attention!” Eddie’s booming voice over the loudspeaker silenced the room. “The six winners of the Heat Race eligible to compete
in the Main Event are: Number one, James Sand. Number two, Paul Miller. Number three, Kim Norman. Number four, Frank Spry.
Number five, Jack Harmon. Number six, Bob Sobus.”

A fist poked Chick gently in the ribs. “Well, how about that? I don’t have to worry about the consolation races!”

Chick turned grim eyes at Jack Harmon. “And I don’t have to worry about being nerfed.”

Too late. The one thing he didn’t want to do anymore was sass. Jack Harmon, in particular. Jack could rattle him to pieces.
And when you’re racing model cars you can’t be rattled or you’re sunk. You can’t think of anything else. You can’t think of
how many laps you’re behind or ahead of the other guy or you’ll lose for sure.